Full Transcript for COMPOST

00:04:06.259 --> 00:04:07.960 But that's really the challenge here in Philly, 00:04:08.219 --> 00:04:11.919 having the space to compost. For sure. And in 00:04:11.919 --> 00:04:14.759 other cities like Austin, Seattle, LA, parts 00:04:14.759 --> 00:04:17.600 of New York, the city actually manages compost 00:04:17.600 --> 00:04:20.379 collection. Here in Philadelphia, it's on residents 00:04:20.379 --> 00:04:23.569 to find ways to compost. And pay for it. Yeah, 00:04:23.569 --> 00:04:26.370 but we are really lucky to have two great companies, 00:04:26.550 --> 00:04:28.829 Circle Compost and Bennett Compost, that we're 00:04:28.829 --> 00:04:31.009 about to hear from in this episode and how they're 00:04:31.009 --> 00:04:32.870 serving the growing needs of residents with food 00:04:32.870 --> 00:04:45.670 waste pickup and composting services. So I'm 00:04:45.670 --> 00:04:48.329 Tim Bennett. I'm the founder of Bennett Compost. 00:04:48.529 --> 00:04:52.139 Bennett Compost is a food scrap collection company 00:04:52.139 --> 00:04:55.600 based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. We are at 00:04:55.600 --> 00:04:59.259 our world headquarters here in the Lawncrest 00:04:59.259 --> 00:05:01.600 neighborhood of Philadelphia, and we collect 00:05:01.600 --> 00:05:05.180 food scraps from about 6 ,100 households and 00:05:05.180 --> 00:05:08.199 130 businesses throughout Philadelphia every 00:05:08.199 --> 00:05:10.800 week. So we go to these homes and businesses, 00:05:11.000 --> 00:05:12.579 we collect their food scraps, we bring it back 00:05:12.579 --> 00:05:16.300 here and we make it into compost and other soil 00:05:16.300 --> 00:05:19.879 mixes for urban gardeners to grow food and flowers. 00:05:25.959 --> 00:05:29.379 My name is David Bluvman. I'm co -founder, co 00:05:29.379 --> 00:05:32.899 -owner, and president of Circle Compost. We have 00:05:32.899 --> 00:05:35.959 a mission to prevent food scraps and other organic 00:05:35.959 --> 00:05:38.639 materials from going to landfills. We accomplish 00:05:38.639 --> 00:05:41.879 that by... picking them up from households and 00:05:41.879 --> 00:05:44.879 also businesses, commercial accounts like restaurants, 00:05:45.420 --> 00:05:48.660 schools, other types of institutions. And we 00:05:48.660 --> 00:05:51.459 make sure that it's composted hyper locally with 00:05:51.459 --> 00:05:54.500 farm partners of ours that are located within 00:05:54.500 --> 00:05:56.860 10 to 15 miles of Center City, Philadelphia. 00:05:59.459 --> 00:06:01.860 The traditional way that we dispose of, most 00:06:01.860 --> 00:06:03.720 people dispose of food these days is in a linear 00:06:03.720 --> 00:06:08.959 system, right? So they buy the food, they consume. 00:06:09.230 --> 00:06:11.389 most of it there might be some trimmings from 00:06:11.389 --> 00:06:13.189 the prep or there might be some portions they 00:06:13.189 --> 00:06:15.189 didn't eat because they're unedible like bones 00:06:15.189 --> 00:06:19.089 and and rinds

or because you know they have kids 00:06:19.089 --> 00:06:21.250 like mine who don't always finish everything 00:06:21.250 --> 00:06:24.769 on their plate and um traditionally they throw 00:06:24.769 --> 00:06:28.009 them into the trash and then it goes to in here 00:06:28.009 --> 00:06:29.569 in Philadelphia that trash gets picked up by 00:06:29.569 --> 00:06:33.250 the city and ends up either at a landfill which 00:06:33.250 --> 00:06:35.790 is a fancy word for a hole in the ground or going 00:06:35.790 --> 00:06:37.750 to an incinerator which is a fancy word for burning 00:06:37.750 --> 00:06:41.790 it. And both sending food waste to landfills 00:06:41.790 --> 00:06:44.790 and incinerators have negative environmental 00:06:44.790 --> 00:06:48.110 consequences. So food waste in landfills tends 00:06:48.110 --> 00:06:50.230 to break down anaerobically, which means it breaks 00:06:50.230 --> 00:06:53.370 down without oxygen, and that produces methane 00:06:53.370 --> 00:06:56.589 gas, which is actually a much more harmful greenhouse 00:06:56.589 --> 00:07:00.670 gas than carbon dioxide. Food waste, like many 00:07:00.670 --> 00:07:02.949 other things that get sent to incinerators, gets 00:07:02.949 --> 00:07:04.990 burned, and that creates air pollution that can 00:07:04.990 --> 00:07:08.819 contribute to issues of asthma and other kind 00:07:08.819 --> 00:07:11.100 of like health issues for people who live nearby 00:07:11.100 --> 00:07:14.720 where the incinerators are. It's actually most 00:07:14.720 --> 00:07:16.980 of Philadelphia's food waste that gets incinerated 00:07:16.980 --> 00:07:19.160 goes to Chester, which is a neighboring city 00:07:19.160 --> 00:07:22.500 to Philadelphia and they have a long history 00:07:22.500 --> 00:07:26.139 of environmental kind of injustice happening 00:07:26.139 --> 00:07:28.439 in that in that city. This is just another example 00:07:28.439 --> 00:07:34.529 of that. Instead of putting food scraps into 00:07:34.529 --> 00:07:37.209 a trash can that then goes to a landfill, by 00:07:37.209 --> 00:07:39.509 composting, the food scraps go into a compost 00:07:39.509 --> 00:07:41.850 pile. The material then breaks down, and not 00:07:41.850 --> 00:07:45.230 only is it now not emitting methane the way it 00:07:45.230 --> 00:07:47.449 would in a landfill, but it's actually absorbing 00:07:47.449 --> 00:07:50.569 carbon dioxide when compost piles are managed 00:07:50.569 --> 00:07:53.610 properly. They absorb carbon dioxide out of the 00:07:53.610 --> 00:07:55.910 atmosphere to help mitigate the effects of climate 00:07:55.910 --> 00:07:59.449 change. And you know, when food scraps go into 00:07:59.449 --> 00:08:02.959 a landfill, Landfills fill up. It's unsustainable. 00:08:03.819 --> 00:08:05.500 So you fill up one landfill, you gotta look for 00:08:05.500 --> 00:08:08.699 more land, which of course land is always at 00:08:08.699 --> 00:08:10.680 a premium and always scarce. You gotta find more 00:08:10.680 -->

00:08:13.139 land to create another landfill. Well, composting 00:08:13.139 --> 00:08:15.100 sites don't work that way. With compost sites, 00:08:16.000 --> 00:08:17.980 food scraps, other organic materials go into 00:08:17.980 --> 00:08:20.259 the compost piles, they break down, they become 00:08:20.259 --> 00:08:23.360 this amazing soil amendment called compost, and 00:08:23.360 --> 00:08:25.079 we can keep bringing material over and over again 00:08:25.079 --> 00:08:26.779 to the same composting sites. So it really is 00:08:26.779 --> 00:08:32.059 a circular solution. My name is Kate. My name 00:08:32.059 --> 00:08:35.860 is Em. I live with Kate. I grew up composting 00:08:35.860 --> 00:08:41.179 at home. Big old pile in the backyard. Nothing 00:08:41.179 --> 00:08:46.480 real sophisticated. And started using a service 00:08:46.480 --> 00:08:51.379 in Philly in 2018 when I lived with a roommate 00:08:51.379 --> 00:08:57.919 who was in the food sort of pipeline industry. 00:08:58.240 --> 00:09:01.120 I have been composting since I moved to Philadelphia 00:09:01.120 --> 00:09:05.179 14 years ago and I was doing it at home for a 00:09:05.179 --> 00:09:08.059 while and then probably in the last four or five 00:09:08.059 --> 00:09:12.019 years I started doing it with a service. I tried 00:09:12.019 --> 00:09:13.720 to do it a couple of different ways. I had like 00:09:13.720 --> 00:09:18.730 a pile and then a tumbler. And I remember, especially 00:09:18.730 --> 00:09:21.509 with the pile, I had tried to place it kind of 00:09:21.509 --> 00:09:24.070 as far away from my actual house as possible. 00:09:24.669 --> 00:09:28.309 And at the time, my neighbors had pointed to 00:09:28.309 --> 00:09:30.769 it and said, what's that? And then they just 00:09:30.769 --> 00:09:32.230 started asking me about whether or not they were 00:09:32.230 --> 00:09:39.709 gonna get compost bugs. And I think that... For 00:09:39.709 --> 00:09:41.450 composting in the city if you're gonna do it 00:09:41.450 --> 00:09:43.269 without a service one of the challenges is like 00:09:43.269 --> 00:09:46.230 where to put it That it's gonna be least offensive 00:09:46.230 --> 00:09:49.830 to everyone And then also not just like a free 00:09:49.830 --> 00:09:52.389 lunch for all of the possums raccoons and rats 00:09:52.389 --> 00:09:56.470 that are in the area I don't really have so much 00:09:56.470 --> 00:09:58.070 of a problem with raccoons and possums, but I 00:09:58.070 --> 00:09:59.669 don't really want rats hanging out in my backyard 00:10:01.990 --> 00:10:06.009 And then for composting too, it was hard to make 00:10:06.009 --> 00:10:08.450 sure that I was getting enough brown like nitrogen 00:10:08.450 --> 00:10:11.970 materials. I do have, I am fortunate to have 00:10:11.970 --> 00:10:15.289 a tree in my backyard, but yeah, I was finding 00:10:15.289 --> 00:10:17.509 that I needed to like be shredding brown paper 00:10:17.509 --> 00:10:20.190 bags and like, you know, like getting newspapers 00:10:20.190 --> 00:10:23.210 from friends to make sure that I had enough brown 00:10:23.210 --> 00:10:26.789 material. Composting is important to me on like 00:10:26.789 --> 00:10:30.529 a larger, I guess like macro or system level. 00:10:31.629 --> 00:10:34.190 Because right now in the US, there are not good 00:10:34.190 --> 00:10:36.690 ways to make use of the materials that get taken 00:10:36.690 --> 00:10:40.870 up by trash. So all that organic waste just sort 00:10:40.870 --> 00:10:43.110 of sits in a landfill and doesn't get used for 00:10:43.110 --> 00:10:46.830 anything good. And composting seems like such 00:10:46.830 --> 00:10:50.149 a no -brainer to be creating regenerative soil. 00:10:51.009 --> 00:10:53.789 And then on a more like personal level, it's 00:10:53.789 --> 00:10:55.730 important to me to have that awareness of my 00:10:55.730 --> 00:10:58.730 own waste. And I feel like I just have like a 00:10:58.730 --> 00:11:03.950 really... direct relationship with what I'm getting 00:11:03.950 --> 00:11:18.909 rid of and where it's going. People could be 00:11:18.909 --> 00:11:20.570 throwing away their food scraps and then buying 00:11:20.570 --> 00:11:24.389 compost and soil from a big box store and it 00:11:24.389 --> 00:11:27.990 would, you know, they're That seems a little 00:11:27.990 --> 00:11:30.149 kind of ridiculous given what could be happening. 00:11:30.169 --> 00:11:32.889 And in fact, you know, there's a agricultural 00:11:32.889 --> 00:11:34.889 high school here in Philadelphia, Saul High School, 00:11:35.210 --> 00:11:37.450 and there's a gentleman who around 13 or 14 years 00:11:37.450 --> 00:11:41.690 ago restarted their composting program for all 00:11:41.690 --> 00:11:44.289 of their animal waste because they have livestock 00:11:44.289 --> 00:11:46.850 there and livestock weight manure. And that happened 00:11:46.850 --> 00:11:50.429 because he moved to the area and he was retired 00:11:50.429 --> 00:11:53.269 and he was volunteering at the farm and one day 00:11:53.269 --> 00:11:55.799 he saw a big truck come and take all the manure 00:11:55.799 --> 00:11:58.100 out of the dairy barn and a couple days later 00:11:58.100 --> 00:11:59.679 he saw another big truck come and dump a big 00:11:59.679 --> 00:12:01.600 load of compost for the farmers and he thought 00:12:01.600 --> 00:12:04.240 oh this is great they've got someone who's like 00:12:04.240 --> 00:12:06.759 composting their stuff and bringing it back to 00:12:06.759 --> 00:12:08.159 them and it turned out that no there were two 00:12:08.159 --> 00:12:10.179 separate companies that they were paying one 00:12:10.179 --> 00:12:13.200 to remove the manure and one to deliver compost 00:12:13.200 --> 00:12:16.500 and so they had all the equipment on site to 00:12:16.500 --> 00:12:19.840 make compost and so he kind of whipped the site 00:12:19.840 --> 00:12:21.539 into shape and started to do that they've been 00:12:21.539 --> 00:12:23.159 doing

that for the last 13 years so I think that's 00:12:23.159 --> 00:12:28.740 just an example of kind of the linear systems 00:12:28.740 --> 00:12:31.980 that we've developed, they may kind of make, 00:12:33.340 --> 00:12:35.039 and at some point they may have made sense for 00:12:35.039 --> 00:12:37.539 various reasons, but they also miss a big part 00:12:37.539 --> 00:12:41.700 of what's possible. When you're composting at 00:12:41.700 --> 00:12:43.480 home, it's a great thing to do, it's a wonderful 00:12:43.480 --> 00:12:45.419 thing to do, but it does take work. You know, 00:12:45.559 --> 00:12:49.299 it's not super easy and... Not everything is 00:12:49.299 --> 00:12:51.159 going to break down in a home composting system 00:12:51.159 --> 00:12:55.320 that will break down in the compost piles that 00:12:55.320 --> 00:12:59.019 we contribute to. So just larger piles, the larger 00:12:59.019 --> 00:13:01.899 the pile is. I mean, our composting site partners 00:13:01.899 --> 00:13:04.019 have hundreds of thousands of dollars of equipment 00:13:04.019 --> 00:13:06.679 to turn the piles and keep things moving. But 00:13:06.679 --> 00:13:09.919 even without all that heavy equipment, just the 00:13:09.919 --> 00:13:13.159 bigger the pile is, the more microbial activity 00:13:13.159 --> 00:13:15.570 and the more stuff will break down. If you're 00:13:15.570 --> 00:13:17.970 composting at home, you've got to have carbon 00:13:17.970 --> 00:13:21.529 -based materials, or browns, so you've got to 00:13:21.529 --> 00:13:25.169 save leaves. In Philly, it's not that hard to 00:13:25.169 --> 00:13:27.690 come up with leaves, but you want to wait until 00:13:27.690 --> 00:13:31.090 they're brown, and you've got to have enough 00:13:31.090 --> 00:13:34.409 around that you can create the appropriate environment 00:13:34.409 --> 00:13:36.250 in your composting system. You need to have your 00:13:36.250 --> 00:13:38.889 ratios correct, approximately two -thirds brown 00:13:38.889 --> 00:13:41.649 materials, carbon -based materials, to one -third 00:13:41.649 --> 00:13:44.179 green materials, nitrogen -based materials. And 00:13:44.179 --> 00:13:45.919 you got to turn the pile. You got to make sure 00:13:45.919 --> 00:13:50.039 it's got the appropriate amount of water to keep 00:13:50.039 --> 00:13:51.639 the pile moist. You got to make sure it's getting 00:13:51.639 --> 00:13:54.600 oxygen. Keep turning it. All of that does take 00:13:54.600 --> 00:13:56.740 work. It's not as simple as just separating the 00:13:56.740 --> 00:13:58.779 food scraps and throwing it somewhere separate. 00:13:59.840 --> 00:14:03.419 Anyone will find that when they start composting 00:14:03.419 --> 00:14:05.059 their food scraps, separating their food scraps 00:14:05.059 --> 00:14:07.320 and not putting them in the trash, their trash 00:14:07.320 --> 00:14:10.220 will be way less heavy. I mean, the heavy stuff. 00:14:10.659 --> 00:14:13.580 is the food scraps. Food scraps are mostly water. 00:14:14.799 --> 00:14:17.980 Almost any food scrap, it's mostly water. So 00:14:17.980 --> 00:14:20.820 that stuff gets heavy. So right away, by taking 00:14:20.820 --> 00:14:22.740 the food scraps out, trash is going to be a lot 00:14:22.740 --> 00:14:24.100 lighter. It's going to be a lot easier taking 00:14:24.100 --> 00:14:26.120 the trash out when you do have trash to take 00:14:26.120 --> 00:14:28.759 out. So that's one thing. Also, food scraps are 00:14:28.759 --> 00:14:30.980 the stuff that when it's in your trash can... 00:14:30.840 --> 00:14:34.740 it can get smelly, it can leak. So our buckets, 00:14:34.759 --> 00:14:38.480 for example, are airtight. You might get a little 00:14:38.480 --> 00:14:40.220 bit of smell of something when you open the bucket 00:14:40.220 --> 00:14:43.480 at first, but... They're airtight, so you're 00:14:43.480 --> 00:14:46.000 not going to worry about any smells like every 00:14:46.000 --> 00:14:48.259 time you're opening your trash or something like 00:14:48.259 --> 00:14:50.840 that, you're not going to smell something. And 00:14:50.840 --> 00:14:53.559 then they can leak as well. I remember one of 00:14:53.559 --> 00:14:55.159 the busiest times we ever had for our business 00:14:55.159 --> 00:14:59.240 was summer of 2020 when COVID hit the sanitation 00:14:59.240 --> 00:15:00.720 department really hard. They had tons of calls 00:15:00.720 --> 00:15:02.240 out, and they weren't picking up trash for weeks 00:15:02.240 --> 00:15:04.519 at a time. Trash was building up in front of 00:15:04.519 --> 00:15:07.320 people's houses. And we had existing customers 00:15:07.320 --> 00:15:10.289 of ours taking pictures. of trash on their block 00:15:10.289 --> 00:15:13.230 and you know posting on social media like please 00:15:13.230 --> 00:15:15.330 neighbor sign up for a composting service because 00:15:15.330 --> 00:15:17.990 you know you could see mice running around these 00:15:17.990 --> 00:15:20.129 trash bags and holes in trash bags and stuff 00:15:20.129 --> 00:15:22.470 leaking and you know it was 100 degrees out in 00:15:22.470 --> 00:15:24.850 July and you know it was just hot and sticky 00:15:24.850 --> 00:15:28.549 and smelly so all of that can be avoided by composting 00:15:28.549 --> 00:15:35.200 when you start composting and the size of your 00:15:35.200 --> 00:15:37.940 trash bags just goes down, or like the length 00:15:37.940 --> 00:15:40.940 of time it takes to fill them just goes way up. 00:15:41.379 --> 00:15:44.340 The amount of food waste that was going in the 00:15:44.340 --> 00:15:46.399 trash before was just so impressive to me and 00:15:46.399 --> 00:15:50.100 it was like a nice little ego bump to see how 00:15:50.100 --> 00:15:53.000 little other trash I was producing when I took 00:15:53.000 --> 00:15:57.440 the food scraps out of it. And for me, my trash 00:15:57.440 --> 00:16:01.559 is so much less stinky when I compost. And it's 00:16:01.559 --> 00:16:04.259 also so much

lighter. That is honestly the, I 00:16:04.259 --> 00:16:07.379 mean, obviously, you know, all of the like moral 00:16:07.379 --> 00:16:10.039 benefits or whatever, but the most immediate 00:16:10.039 --> 00:16:12.960 ones are my regular trash does not smell bad 00:16:12.960 --> 00:16:15.860 and it doesn't weigh a lot. Yeah, I'm with Em 00:16:15.860 --> 00:16:20.419 on the benefits. We have a tiny trash can. It's 00:16:20.419 --> 00:16:22.799 like five liters or something. And sometimes 00:16:22.799 --> 00:16:25.240 we don't fill it in a week. It's more often that 00:16:25.240 --> 00:16:29.549 we fill up a 10 gallon bucket. and we do our 00:16:29.549 --> 00:16:34.470 little like five liter trash can. And what is 00:16:34.470 --> 00:16:36.049 in that trash can usually is just packaging. 00:16:37.610 --> 00:16:41.750 It's also cool if you opt into it to get some 00:16:41.750 --> 00:16:43.409 of the compost that the companies make and use 00:16:43.409 --> 00:16:46.200 it in your garden. Across the street from us 00:16:46.200 --> 00:16:49.440 is there's like a little community garden and 00:16:49.440 --> 00:16:51.879 they make use of the composting services especially 00:16:51.879 --> 00:16:56.179 for weed pickup and clippings which just makes 00:16:56.179 --> 00:16:59.620 it so much easier to feel like you're able to 00:16:59.620 --> 00:17:02.820 take care of a space and do so responsibly. And 00:17:02.820 --> 00:17:04.680 I think people on the block are really into the 00:17:04.680 --> 00:17:07.180 fact too that like they can participate in that 00:17:07.180 --> 00:17:24.220 together. Oftentimes people ask like why the 00:17:24.220 --> 00:17:26.559 city doesn't do their own composting and some 00:17:26.559 --> 00:17:28.940 of it is because There's there's not necessarily 00:17:28.940 --> 00:17:32.859 like a one kind of magic answer, right? I mean 00:17:32.859 --> 00:17:36.279 Philadelphia is behind Kind of cities like New 00:17:36.279 --> 00:17:39.059 York City and Boston and DC in addition to cities 00:17:39.059 --> 00:17:41.420 on the West Coast That are kind of all moving 00:17:41.420 --> 00:17:43.500 ahead at a much are all ahead of where Philadelphia 00:17:43.500 --> 00:17:46.099 kind of is in terms of composting some of it 00:17:46.099 --> 00:17:49.619 is that you know, Philadelphia is a higher poverty 00:17:49.619 --> 00:17:51.240 city than a lot of these other cities and so 00:17:51.240 --> 00:17:54.319 it has less kind of overall money per citizen 00:17:54.319 --> 00:17:57.920 and maybe more more kind of needs that it sees. 00:17:58.319 --> 00:17:59.799 Part of it is that the region itself doesn't 00:17:59.799 --> 00:18:01.599 have the infrastructure so even if the city said 00:18:01.599 --> 00:18:04.579 hey we want to do a curbside pickup tomorrow 00:18:04.579 --> 00:18:07.920 from everyone there's not the facilities to send 00:18:07.920 --> 00:18:10.519 it to to handle all that material. But also some 00:18:10.519 --> 00:18:13.079 of it is that there hasn't been a push from the 00:18:13.079 --> 00:18:15.319 city to try to figure out how to develop pilot 00:18:15.319 --> 00:18:18.779 programs or develop partial programs or drop 00:18:18.779 --> 00:18:21.900 -off programs in a serious way, in my opinion, 00:18:22.099 --> 00:18:23.819 to make that happen. And some of that is because 00:18:23.819 --> 00:18:26.119 it involves resources, right? I mean, the city 00:18:26.119 --> 00:18:27.819 would have to spend the money to do that, and 00:18:27.819 --> 00:18:30.480 they haven't done that. You know, we have talked 00:18:30.480 --> 00:18:32.720 to people at the city at various levels about 00:18:32.720 --> 00:18:34.980 different ways that they could do that, and my 00:18:34.980 --> 00:18:36.980 hope is that they will do some things over the 00:18:36.980 --> 00:18:39.759 next couple years, but that it kind of remains 00:18:39.759 --> 00:18:42.000 to be determined and probably also will depend 00:18:42.000 --> 00:18:45.740 on how much people agitate and kind of demand 00:18:45.740 --> 00:18:51.160 that it happens. I'd love to see the city roll 00:18:51.160 --> 00:18:54.700 out some sort of composting opportunity for residents 00:18:54.700 --> 00:18:57.740 that's city funded, but I'm a huge believer that 00:18:57.740 --> 00:18:59.839 it should be opt -in, meaning that residents 00:18:59.839 --> 00:19:04.160 should have the choice whether to, at least for 00:19:04.160 --> 00:19:07.460 a number of years when something rolls out, residents 00:19:07.460 --> 00:19:09.779 should have the choice of whether to opt -in 00:19:09.779 --> 00:19:12.980 or not. You know, customers who sign up for a 00:19:12.980 --> 00:19:16.079 paid composting service like Soil Compost. Obviously, 00:19:16.420 --> 00:19:20.079 they care enough to pay for a service, right? 00:19:20.339 --> 00:19:22.779 So you know right there that they care. And, 00:19:22.839 --> 00:19:25.900 you know, we're all humans, right? We're all 00:19:25.900 --> 00:19:28.619 flawed, right? So even with people who care enough 00:19:28.619 --> 00:19:30.099 to sign up for a composting service like ours, 00:19:30.700 --> 00:19:33.599 we still get, you know, it's not a huge percentage 00:19:33.599 --> 00:19:35.460 of contamination, but we still get, you know, 00:19:35.579 --> 00:19:37.660 whether it's rubber bands around the end of produce 00:19:37.660 --> 00:19:41.980 or... plastic bags that carrots came in, or a 00:19:41.980 --> 00:19:44.099 bag that looks like it should be compostable, 00:19:44.099 --> 00:19:47.720 but it's not. And then we get random stuff that 00:19:47.720 --> 00:19:50.420 might just end up in there completely by accident. 00:19:51.400 --> 00:19:53.990 This is what we do. This is our business. So 00:19:53.990 --> 00:19:56.450 every pickup that we make, if there's contamination, 00:19:57.029 --> 00:19:58.890 we flag it and we reach out to the customer and 00:19:58.890 --> 00:20:01.130 we just say, hey, please try to avoid this

going 00:20:01.130 --> 00:20:04.730 forward. That's something that's, I think, probably 00:20:04.730 --> 00:20:09.589 extremely difficult to do for any city, for any 00:20:09.589 --> 00:20:12.589 kind of municipal system. When people are forced 00:20:12.589 --> 00:20:15.009 to do it, they're not going to do it right in 00:20:15.009 --> 00:20:17.509 the case of composting. And if you get enough 00:20:17.509 --> 00:20:21.119 contamination, what happens is you defeat the 00:20:21.119 --> 00:20:23.619 entire purpose. So whatever funding would be 00:20:23.619 --> 00:20:26.519 allocated toward city composting, if it doesn't 00:20:26.519 --> 00:20:29.299 go well and you get a lot of contamination, you 00:20:29.299 --> 00:20:31.500 know, it just defeats the entire purpose and 00:20:31.500 --> 00:20:33.500 material ends up in a landfill or an incinerator 00:20:33.500 --> 00:20:40.759 anyway. I think if the city was running pilot 00:20:40.759 --> 00:20:44.500 programs as, I'll give you for example, DC launched 00:20:44.500 --> 00:20:47.819 a curbside pilot a couple years ago and they 00:20:47.819 --> 00:20:51.059 are not doing the collections themselves. There's 00:20:51.059 --> 00:20:54.380 a contract that they have out to local private 00:20:54.380 --> 00:20:58.059 companies to operate. This is not the big multinationals. 00:20:58.240 --> 00:21:02.339 This is not these gigantic international corporations. 00:21:02.460 --> 00:21:05.839 These are local DC or DC area -based companies 00:21:05.839 --> 00:21:09.480 that are doing this work. This spring, they put 00:21:09.480 --> 00:21:13.059 out proposals to expand that program from their 00:21:13.059 --> 00:21:17.019 initial 5 ,000 household pilot to, I think, 10, 00:21:17.019 --> 00:21:19.680 and then 20, and then 50 ,000 households, right? 00:21:19.779 --> 00:21:22.339 And so I think if cities are interested in kind 00:21:22.339 --> 00:21:23.660 of doing this and they're also interested in 00:21:23.660 --> 00:21:25.759 kind of hiring local companies to do that, I 00:21:25.759 --> 00:21:27.299 absolutely think that there's demand from the 00:21:27.299 --> 00:21:29.839 public for these services, right? Like not everyone's 00:21:29.839 --> 00:21:31.440 gonna pay for it, but there are plenty of people 00:21:31.440 --> 00:21:33.660 who would do it if it was free and they were 00:21:33.660 --> 00:21:36.559 kind of aware of it. And it just cuts across 00:21:36.559 --> 00:21:39.680 neighborhoods, it cuts across racial and ethnic 00:21:39.680 --> 00:21:43.319 groups. I mean, I think back to a meeting I was 00:21:43.319 --> 00:21:47.160 at. maybe two months ago in Hunting Park and 00:21:47.160 --> 00:21:50.359 you know maybe half the people in the room spoke 00:21:50.359 --> 00:21:52.599 English the other half spoke Spanish and so we 00:21:52.599 --> 00:21:54.200 had someone there was someone who was translating 00:21:54.200 --> 00:21:57.259 stuff and four minutes into my presentation about 00:21:57.259 --> 00:22:00.180 composting this one woman kind of raised her 00:22:00.180 --> 00:22:01.900 hand who didn't speak any English and just was 00:22:01.900 --> 00:22:04.000 basically like all right you know so how do I 00:22:04.000 --> 00:22:06.519 get how do I get started, right? Like what do 00:22:06.519 --> 00:22:08.880 I need to do? And so, you know, there are solutions 00:22:08.880 --> 00:22:11.299 there, but I think if the city wants to see more 00:22:11.299 --> 00:22:13.119 composting happen, there are ways to do that 00:22:13.119 --> 00:22:15.660 that both encourage and support the growth of 00:22:15.660 --> 00:22:19.019 local businesses, but also like make composting 00:22:19.019 --> 00:22:21.079 much more accessible to the wider population. 00:22:23.440 --> 00:22:25.099 One of Tim Bennett's favorite lines is that if 00:22:25.099 --> 00:22:28.740 you add up both of our businesses, it's approximately 00:22:28.740 --> 00:22:31.259 one to two percent. on the household side. It's 00:22:31.259 --> 00:22:33.339 approximately one to two percent of the households 00:22:33.339 --> 00:22:35.599 in Philadelphia. So, you know, right here in 00:22:35.599 --> 00:22:37.759 Philly, there's a huge opportunity to get more 00:22:37.759 --> 00:22:40.579 people on board composting. And how we do that, 00:22:41.200 --> 00:22:43.400 you know, doing our best with education on the 00:22:43.400 --> 00:22:45.160 education side of things, doing our best to get 00:22:45.160 --> 00:22:48.640 the message out and, you know, hoping that people 00:22:48.640 --> 00:22:51.019 discover our businesses and want to get on board. 00:22:54.589 --> 00:22:56.309 Bennett Compost got started because I was living 00:22:56.309 --> 00:22:59.809 in South Philly in 2009 in a second floor apartment 00:22:59.809 --> 00:23:02.890 and I had no outdoor space and I wanted to I 00:23:02.890 --> 00:23:04.910 kind of learned a little bit about composting 00:23:04.910 --> 00:23:06.630 and I was like I should be doing this but I didn't 00:23:06.630 --> 00:23:09.329 I didn't know how to I didn't have any outdoor 00:23:09.329 --> 00:23:11.670 space to do my own composting so I started to 00:23:11.670 --> 00:23:13.210 look around was there someplace I could take 00:23:13.210 --> 00:23:15.890 it I didn't find anywhere that I could take the 00:23:15.890 --> 00:23:17.130 material was there someone who would pick it 00:23:17.130 --> 00:23:19.089 up and do it and the way that the city picked 00:23:19.089 --> 00:23:21.430 up right like there's a way the city magically 00:23:21.430 --> 00:23:25.529 made my trash and recyclables disappear And so 00:23:25.529 --> 00:23:28.410 I thought maybe there's some other kind of weirdos 00:23:28.410 --> 00:23:31.690 like me who would who would Are also trying to 00:23:31.690 --> 00:23:34.190 solve this this kind of problem that they have 00:23:34.190 --> 00:23:39.150 So I You know, I was kind of at a place in my 00:23:39.150 --> 00:23:40.950 life I was in my late 20s and I was

kind of trying 00:23:40.950 --> 00:23:45.250 to figure out what I was gonna do next And I 00:23:45.250 --> 00:23:47.470 kind of always had this idea that maybe I'd want 00:23:47.470 --> 00:23:50.809 to Have my own business and try try my hand at 00:23:50.809 --> 00:23:53.180 that And so I put 100 bucks in a bank account 00:23:53.180 --> 00:23:57.099 and said, we'll see what happens. And I had no 00:23:57.099 --> 00:23:58.839 idea what it would turn into or what it would 00:23:58.839 --> 00:24:01.380 do. And I just kind of started very small scale. 00:24:01.740 --> 00:24:03.779 And over the last, I guess, geez, at this point, 00:24:03.859 --> 00:24:09.079 almost 16 years, it's really kind of like it's 00:24:09.079 --> 00:24:13.539 grown beyond my expectations. My name is Julie 00:24:13.539 --> 00:24:18.339 Leonard -Palmer. and I live in Fishtown. I have 00:24:18.339 --> 00:24:23.200 been a customer at Bennett Compost for the last 00:24:23.200 --> 00:24:26.640 couple years. We decided to compost primarily 00:24:26.640 --> 00:24:31.599 because we have a six -year -old and with that 00:24:31.599 --> 00:24:36.720 comes more food base than we would like and our 00:24:36.720 --> 00:24:41.339 trash just kind of got out of hand. So composting 00:24:41.339 --> 00:24:43.819 was good for our trash and then also good for 00:24:43.819 --> 00:24:49.109 the planet. It's just been so easy. I've personally 00:24:49.109 --> 00:24:53.609 benefited from Bennett's services because our 00:24:53.609 --> 00:24:57.789 trash is not as smelly and not as full. Don't 00:24:57.789 --> 00:25:02.930 feel as bad when, you know, our son doesn't eat 00:25:02.930 --> 00:25:05.730 something or when we can't finish it or when 00:25:05.730 --> 00:25:10.829 food goes bad. Our community hopefully is benefiting 00:25:10.829 --> 00:25:14.990 from you know, having the opportunity to get 00:25:14.990 --> 00:25:18.849 soil from Bennett and from the fact that we don't 00:25:18.849 --> 00:25:21.990 contribute as much trash to the street. If I 00:25:21.990 --> 00:25:24.069 was speaking to someone who had never heard of 00:25:24.069 --> 00:25:27.910 Bennett compost or composting in general, I would 00:25:27.910 --> 00:25:32.150 tell them that Bennett compost is kind of like 00:25:32.150 --> 00:25:35.630 a hack, you know? You don't have to actually 00:25:35.630 --> 00:25:40.410 put that much effort into composting. just collect 00:25:40.410 --> 00:25:42.890 it in your bucket, and we actually pay a little 00:25:42.890 --> 00:25:45.990 bit extra. So Bennett returns a clean bucket 00:25:45.990 --> 00:25:47.910 every week. We don't even clean our bucket. It's 00:25:47.910 --> 00:25:51.970 just very easy. It's like the laziest version 00:25:51.970 --> 00:25:54.250 of composting, but it works for us. It works 00:25:54.250 --> 00:25:58.170 for our busy lifestyle. It's kind of like participating 00:25:58.170 --> 00:26:01.730 in this cycle. You know, we are there in the 00:26:01.730 --> 00:26:05.529 beginning with the food that would be going to 00:26:05.529 --> 00:26:07.529 the landfill otherwise, and then we get to reap 00:26:07.529 --> 00:26:12.940 the benefits. with using the soil to grow potentially 00:26:12.940 --> 00:26:17.279 more food when we, you know, can get any plants 00:26:17.279 --> 00:26:21.319 to grow on our roof. The primary thing that we 00:26:21.319 --> 00:26:23.359 do is do residential collection of food scraps. 00:26:23.400 --> 00:26:26.480 So we provide people with a five gallon lidded 00:26:26.480 --> 00:26:30.200 container that people put their food scraps in 00:26:30.200 --> 00:26:32.740 and we come by their home or apartment once a 00:26:32.740 --> 00:26:34.900 week, just the same frequency usually as their 00:26:34.900 --> 00:26:38.650 trash or recycling and we empty, we take away 00:26:38.650 --> 00:26:39.930 their food scraps that they've collected and 00:26:39.930 --> 00:26:41.869 we bring it back and we make it into compost, 00:26:42.529 --> 00:26:44.849 right? And so it really is kind of the idea of 00:26:44.849 --> 00:26:46.670 trying to make it as similar to how they're already 00:26:46.670 --> 00:26:50.829 kind of, their material will be managed anyway, 00:26:50.990 --> 00:26:53.450 how they would be dealing with it, and kind of 00:26:53.450 --> 00:26:56.589 just giving them another option to do that. And 00:26:56.589 --> 00:27:00.269 so that's the primary way people pay a fee for 00:27:00.269 --> 00:27:03.990 that service. And they also get back some finished 00:27:03.990 --> 00:27:08.049 compost throughout the year. if they want to, 00:27:08.049 --> 00:27:10.809 to use in their own kind of home gardening and 00:27:10.809 --> 00:27:14.490 growing environments. So that's kind of how we 00:27:14.490 --> 00:27:15.990 started and that's still kind of the biggest 00:27:15.990 --> 00:27:19.549 portion of what we do. At least 20 % of the household 00:27:19.549 --> 00:27:21.210 collections that we do are in the Riverwards 00:27:21.210 --> 00:27:24.670 neighborhoods. And all of the collections that 00:27:24.670 --> 00:27:26.230 we're doing in those, the residential collections 00:27:26.230 --> 00:27:27.109 we're doing in the neighborhood, we're doing 00:27:27.109 --> 00:27:30.269 via electric bicycles. Actually, our bicycle 00:27:30.269 --> 00:27:32.869 fleet that does, we do about 40 % of our total. 00:27:33.160 --> 00:27:35.920 collections via electric bicycle. So everything 00:27:35.920 --> 00:27:39.680 from, you know, the Schuylkill to the Delaware, 00:27:40.759 --> 00:27:43.740 from Washington Avenue in South Philly up to 00:27:43.740 --> 00:27:46.240 Lehigh Avenue in North Philly, and some stuff 00:27:46.240 --> 00:27:49.400 on the above and below those, but everything 00:27:49.400 --> 00:27:51.140 in between those we do via electric bicycle. 00:27:51.500 --> 00:27:53.079 So that includes a large portion of the River 00:27:53.079 --> 00:27:58.079 Words neighborhoods. And we are actually, our 00:27:58.079 -->

00:28:00.500 bicycle fleet is not based out of this main location, 00:28:00.539 --> 00:28:03.480 it's actually based out of a location is right 00:28:03.480 --> 00:28:07.519 off of Frankfurt and Huntington. We also do collections 00:28:07.519 --> 00:28:10.660 from kind of commercial people now so that maybe 00:28:10.660 --> 00:28:13.339 they have larger containers they may have multiple 00:28:13.339 --> 00:28:15.319 times a week pick up they may have a daily pick 00:28:15.319 --> 00:28:17.400 up even we have some people we work with at this 00:28:17.400 --> 00:28:19.980 point who have a daily pick up so we're doing 00:28:19.980 --> 00:28:21.480 those collections and again we're bringing it 00:28:21.480 --> 00:28:25.079 back here we're making it into composts and so 00:28:25.079 --> 00:28:27.180 we've permitted this facility and started processing 00:28:27.180 --> 00:28:29.180 material in city land. We worked with the city 00:28:29.180 --> 00:28:32.420 of Philadelphia to help the state develop a permit 00:28:32.420 --> 00:28:35.160 that now anyone in the state can use to permit 00:28:35.160 --> 00:28:38.119 a facility of this size in an appropriate way. 00:28:39.720 --> 00:28:41.779 We do a bunch of work with the city. We do collection 00:28:41.779 --> 00:28:43.819 from all the rec centers and so a number of them 00:28:43.819 --> 00:28:45.559 are in, you know, they're based throughout the 00:28:45.559 --> 00:28:47.039 city, but all the rec, at this point all the 00:28:47.039 --> 00:28:49.420 rec centers that have after -school programs. 00:28:50.150 --> 00:28:53.210 with food. We are collecting any other food scraps 00:28:53.210 --> 00:28:55.369 from there. We have done some training. The city 00:28:55.369 --> 00:28:57.069 also runs their community composting network. 00:28:57.170 --> 00:29:04.950 So that's a collection of compost site, volunteer 00:29:04.950 --> 00:29:07.150 run compost sites that the city helps pay for 00:29:07.150 --> 00:29:09.670 the startup and then their volunteer run. And 00:29:09.670 --> 00:29:12.730 some of them take food scraps from outside of 00:29:12.730 --> 00:29:14.529 their kind of like membership base and some of 00:29:14.529 --> 00:29:16.750 them just take from the community garden or the 00:29:16.750 --> 00:29:18.809 school or wherever the location is that they 00:29:18.809 --> 00:29:22.180 are from. We've done some, we don't do a lot 00:29:22.180 --> 00:29:25.740 of work with them. We do deliver some compost 00:29:25.740 --> 00:29:28.519 back to sites that are associated with them. 00:29:28.519 --> 00:29:33.220 And we also have done some training on kind of 00:29:33.220 --> 00:29:35.019 as they're starting, standing up new sites, they're 00:29:35.019 --> 00:29:36.859 in the process of standing up a second and third 00:29:36.859 --> 00:29:38.700 kind of like cohort of sites. And so we've done 00:29:38.700 --> 00:29:41.019 some training for the second cohort in the past. 00:29:42.819 --> 00:29:44.119 In addition to this partnership with the city 00:29:44.119 --> 00:29:47.460 we have, we've now helped a second. city agency 00:29:47.460 --> 00:29:48.960 the Department of Prisons who we do some work 00:29:48.960 --> 00:29:51.599 with because they actually had a compost facility 00:29:51.599 --> 00:29:53.599 on site that they built because they're feeding 00:29:53.599 --> 00:29:57.779 now I think it's around 3 ,500 people three meals 00:29:57.779 --> 00:30:03.420 a day 365 days a year but at the height of their 00:30:03.420 --> 00:30:07.460 population they had almost 10 ,000 people there 00:30:07.460 --> 00:30:10.480 and so they're 10 ,000 people there's a lot of 00:30:10.480 --> 00:30:13.660 food that has to get produced to feed that many 00:30:13.660 --> 00:30:16.390 people three days three times a day. during 65 00:30:16.390 --> 00:30:18.970 days a year. So they operated what was called 00:30:18.970 --> 00:30:21.710 a captive facility which meant that they could 00:30:21.710 --> 00:30:23.750 do their own material but couldn't bring in outside 00:30:23.750 --> 00:30:27.589 stuff. During COVID with a lot of their staffing 00:30:27.589 --> 00:30:30.529 problems they weren't able to operate their facility 00:30:30.529 --> 00:30:32.990 and so they brought us in to do that and so since 00:30:32.990 --> 00:30:36.289 then we've actually helped them to expand to 00:30:36.289 --> 00:30:37.950 get a permit that will allow them to now take 00:30:37.950 --> 00:30:41.390 outside stuff and they're in the process of setting 00:30:41.390 --> 00:30:44.250 up some community kind of drop -off programs 00:30:44.250 --> 00:30:46.599 for the neighborhood. in the northeast where 00:30:46.599 --> 00:30:49.759 the prison complex is to kind of be able to take 00:30:49.759 --> 00:30:52.440 some of that outside food waste and process it 00:30:52.440 --> 00:30:54.279 on site. We've been working with them for that. 00:30:55.000 --> 00:30:57.420 The residential growth for our kind of like fee 00:30:57.420 --> 00:30:59.640 -for -service model is still growing, but it's 00:30:59.640 --> 00:31:01.519 slowed down significantly over the last probably 00:31:01.519 --> 00:31:05.480 two or three years from the kind of like pre 00:31:05.480 --> 00:31:10.279 and during COVID kind of boom. And so, you know, 00:31:10.279 --> 00:31:13.900 we are kind of exploring new models. We are continuing 00:31:13.900 --> 00:31:19.059 to grow our soil products and our compost products 00:31:19.059 --> 00:31:21.940 for growing material in raised beds or growing 00:31:21.940 --> 00:31:27.420 material in containers. We are now doing a succulent 00:31:27.420 --> 00:31:31.059 and cactus mix, which is combining compost with 00:31:31.059 --> 00:31:34.319 recycled glass. We do have a partnership with 00:31:34.319 --> 00:31:38.819 Bottle on the Ground to make our cactus and succulent 00:31:38.819 --> 00:31:43.130 blend, which we call our gritty blend. So that 00:31:43.130 --> 00:31:45.009 is a combination where we are

getting recycled 00:31:45.009 --> 00:31:47.130 glass from them and we are blending it with compost 00:31:47.130 --> 00:31:50.170 to make some food waste. It was actually a partnership 00:31:50.170 --> 00:31:53.069 that was brought together by a group called Olin, 00:31:53.309 --> 00:31:55.049 initially, who brought some of the partners together, 00:31:55.069 --> 00:31:58.450 but now it kind of lives on with these two circular 00:31:58.450 --> 00:32:01.910 businesses, so that's pretty cool. We also do 00:32:01.910 --> 00:32:05.029 some work with Revolution Recovery, who is a 00:32:05.029 --> 00:32:07.410 construction and demolition recycling company 00:32:07.410 --> 00:32:12.680 based here in Philadelphia. And we've done some 00:32:12.680 --> 00:32:15.500 various things with them over the years and we've 00:32:15.500 --> 00:32:17.960 used them as a source sometimes for carbon and 00:32:17.960 --> 00:32:19.940 other kind of wood chips and other products that 00:32:19.940 --> 00:32:24.000 we need. So we have done some work with circular 00:32:24.000 --> 00:32:29.720 businesses. We also kind of work with the other 00:32:29.720 --> 00:32:32.329 composters. who are in the in the region. I mean 00:32:32.329 --> 00:32:34.410 there aren't a lot of us, so people like Circle 00:32:34.410 --> 00:32:37.450 Compost, Mother Compost, Waste Well, we are probably 00:32:37.450 --> 00:32:38.890 not always looking at their ways that we can 00:32:38.890 --> 00:32:41.630 kind of collaborate together. It is still a very 00:32:41.630 --> 00:32:43.210 nascent industry and so we all feel like we're 00:32:43.210 --> 00:32:45.670 stronger kind of together than we are when we're 00:32:45.670 --> 00:32:47.630 all then we are kind of fighting with each other. 00:32:47.809 --> 00:32:49.509 Anytime you're in the same space as someone else 00:32:49.509 --> 00:32:52.430 there's obviously some competition for for customers 00:32:52.430 --> 00:32:55.869 but I think we also have a very kind of collegial 00:32:55.869 --> 00:32:58.109 relationship and a very collaborative relationship 00:32:58.109 --> 00:33:01.609 where we're working together to try to push the 00:33:01.609 --> 00:33:03.849 bigger issue of composting forward in general. 00:33:09.269 --> 00:33:12.990 We started ServoCompost in 2016. My wife Michelle, 00:33:13.230 --> 00:33:15.890 she's still our majority owner. We started it 00:33:15.890 --> 00:33:18.799 together. I had a career in the textile recycling 00:33:18.799 --> 00:33:21.420 world prior to Circle Compost. When I was at 00:33:21.420 --> 00:33:24.079 a conference, we get a speaker that was focused 00:33:24.079 --> 00:33:26.660 on textile recycling. They had a pie chart up 00:33:26.660 --> 00:33:28.160 while they were speaking, and it showed landfill 00:33:28.160 --> 00:33:31.119 composition. But looking at this pie chart, somewhere 00:33:31.119 --> 00:33:33.940 between 25 % to 30 % at the time of landfill 00:33:33.940 --> 00:33:36.720 composition was food scraps or

organic materials. 00:33:36.779 --> 00:33:39.019 So that was kind of the moment for me where I 00:33:39.019 --> 00:33:41.619 said, whoa, you know, that's... That's a lot. 00:33:41.660 --> 00:33:43.660 That's a high percentage. So I came back from 00:33:43.660 --> 00:33:45.480 the conference, started talking to my wife, Michelle. 00:33:45.940 --> 00:33:47.819 What can we do here? Is there an opportunity 00:33:47.819 --> 00:33:49.920 for us to do something? So it took us a little 00:33:49.920 --> 00:33:53.980 over a year from the time we had the idea to 00:33:53.980 --> 00:33:56.980 potentially do this until the time that we actually 00:33:56.980 --> 00:33:58.779 launched. We saw there was already one company 00:33:58.779 --> 00:34:02.240 doing composting in Philly, but we felt there 00:34:02.240 --> 00:34:06.319 was room for a second one. We started out just 00:34:06.319 --> 00:34:09.719 one. Household and shortly after that one coffee 00:34:09.719 --> 00:34:13.420 shop one daycare Everything was by bike initially, 00:34:13.420 --> 00:34:16.280 you know for our first I don't remember a year 00:34:16.280 --> 00:34:20.019 or so And then it just kind of grew from there. 00:34:20.019 --> 00:34:23.440 We don't quite cover 100 % of Philadelphia, but 00:34:23.440 --> 00:34:26.960 all of Center City Delaware River to Schuylkill 00:34:26.960 --> 00:34:30.639 River pretty much all of West Philly You know 00:34:30.639 --> 00:34:32.780 as far south and South Philly as you can go and 00:34:32.780 --> 00:34:37.199 then north We go up into East Falls, Manayunk, 00:34:37.360 --> 00:34:40.239 that area now, Roxboro. We have a pretty good 00:34:40.239 --> 00:34:43.260 customer base in Northern Liberties, Fishtown, 00:34:43.440 --> 00:34:46.699 Kensington, Fort Richmond. It's grown pretty 00:34:46.699 --> 00:34:49.719 steadily. We're there at least two days per week, 00:34:49.719 --> 00:34:53.360 every single week. And yeah, it's been a good 00:34:53.360 --> 00:34:56.559 base for us there. We have a whole variety of 00:34:56.559 --> 00:34:59.480 options on the composting side. You know, we 00:34:59.480 --> 00:35:01.650 have a two gallon bucket. Our two gallon buckets 00:35:01.650 --> 00:35:03.469 are only swapped. You know, we take the full 00:35:03.469 --> 00:35:06.750 one and leave a clean, empty one. We can do that 00:35:06.750 --> 00:35:08.849 weekly or every other week. And then with our 00:35:08.849 --> 00:35:10.789 five gallon buckets, we can either empty the 00:35:10.789 --> 00:35:13.469 bucket or swap it. And we can do that weekly 00:35:13.469 --> 00:35:17.070 or every other week. We do provide finished compost 00:35:17.070 --> 00:35:19.989 back to our customers. We tried to create as 00:35:19.989 --> 00:35:22.869 many options as we could manage as a company 00:35:22.869 --> 00:35:25.329 so that hopefully there's something that fits 00:35:25.329 --> 00:35:28.300 for everyone. So, you know, someone who... maybe 00:35:28.300 --> 00:35:30.880 lives alone, maybe doesn't cook often, but makes 00:35:30.880 --> 00:35:32.760 their own coffee every morning. They might only 00:35:32.760 --> 00:35:35.820 want our two gallon bucket serviced every other 00:35:35.820 --> 00:35:40.820 week. Someone who cooks all the time, maybe has 00:35:40.820 --> 00:35:42.920 kids in the house, something like that, might 00:35:42.920 --> 00:35:46.019 want one of our five gallon buckets emptied out 00:35:46.019 --> 00:35:51.460 or swapped out every single week. Hey, my name 00:35:51.460 --> 00:35:54.659 is Mike and I live in Fishtown. We've been a 00:35:54.659 --> 00:35:57.159 customer at Circle Compost for the last four 00:35:57.159 --> 00:36:00.159 or so years. It was actually one of the very 00:36:00.159 --> 00:36:02.639 first things we did after we bought our house. 00:36:03.340 --> 00:36:05.440 If you have never heard of Circle and have never 00:36:05.440 --> 00:36:08.639 heard of composting, it's as easy as, you know, 00:36:08.840 --> 00:36:11.079 diving in and getting started. There really isn't 00:36:11.079 --> 00:36:14.940 a ton to learn as far as how to use the service. 00:36:15.320 --> 00:36:19.300 It is super, super straightforward. It's basically, 00:36:19.300 --> 00:36:23.050 you know, just... You put your food waste in 00:36:23.050 --> 00:36:25.130 your bin outside and then bring it out the door, 00:36:25.230 --> 00:36:30.369 at least for us, every Monday. It's really straightforward 00:36:30.369 --> 00:36:33.929 and I found the team to be very, you know, super 00:36:33.929 --> 00:36:37.070 responsive if there's any questions, super helpful. 00:36:38.349 --> 00:36:40.789 So yeah, I think it's, you know, if you're kind 00:36:40.789 --> 00:36:43.530 of a pompous curious, it's worth giving it a 00:36:43.530 --> 00:36:48.909 shot. We have a pretty wide variety of commercial 00:36:48.909 --> 00:36:51.750 customers. Everything from, you know, a large 00:36:51.750 --> 00:36:55.869 university to a daycare to a small school, coffee 00:36:55.869 --> 00:36:58.949 shops, you know, fast casual restaurants. And 00:36:58.949 --> 00:37:02.809 for restaurants, we offer a 32 gallon wheeled 00:37:02.809 --> 00:37:05.289 toter, so they can fill up those toters. And 00:37:05.289 --> 00:37:07.650 what we do is we use a truck that has a lift 00:37:07.650 --> 00:37:10.449 gate in the back, so the truck lifts up the full 00:37:10.449 --> 00:37:13.110 toter, we put it on the truck, and then we leave 00:37:13.110 --> 00:37:16.699 a rinsed out toter every time. You know currently 00:37:16.699 --> 00:37:19.840 we don't have our own permitted composting facility. 00:37:19.900 --> 00:37:22.360 We're partnered with permitted composting facilities, 00:37:22.619 --> 00:37:24.420 but you know if you want to find a place in the 00:37:24.420 --> 00:37:28.199 city or very close to the city to create a permitted 00:37:28.199 --> 00:37:31.139 composting site, that's very difficult. It's 00:37:31.139 --> 00:37:34.480 hard to find a property that

would meet the criteria. 00:37:35.760 --> 00:37:37.699 If you find something that meets the criteria, 00:37:38.159 --> 00:37:41.039 well, are you able to lease that property? If 00:37:41.039 --> 00:37:42.079 you're not able to lease that property, are you 00:37:42.079 --> 00:37:44.900 able to buy that property? If it's even possible 00:37:44.900 --> 00:37:47.199 to buy that property, is the land so expensive 00:37:47.199 --> 00:37:49.840 that it's actually not possible because it's 00:37:49.840 --> 00:37:56.159 too expensive? So that's one thing. There's definitely 00:37:56.159 --> 00:37:59.380 a need as more and more people compost hopefully 00:37:59.380 --> 00:38:00.920 and more and more organizations and businesses 00:38:00.920 --> 00:38:04.099 compost Hopefully we do need additional composting 00:38:04.099 --> 00:38:06.119 capacity and you know, that's that's a challenge 00:38:06.119 --> 00:38:09.219 is where will that capacity? Where will it be? 00:38:11.099 --> 00:38:14.400 You know, we still need a place just to you know, 00:38:14.559 --> 00:38:16.619 park our bikes and our bike trailers and our 00:38:16.619 --> 00:38:19.360 and our motor vehicles You know not easy to find 00:38:19.360 --> 00:38:22.210 a place within the city or close to the city 00:38:22.210 --> 00:38:24.829 where you can park these kinds of vehicles and 00:38:24.829 --> 00:38:26.630 have a viable business because it's expensive, 00:38:26.630 --> 00:38:30.590 you know, to park. It's not easy to find a place 00:38:30.590 --> 00:38:33.030 to keep a bike and a bike trailer where you can 00:38:33.030 --> 00:38:35.110 get on a bike and that bike trailer and then 00:38:35.110 --> 00:38:37.909 bike right into your service areas and start 00:38:37.909 --> 00:38:40.429 making pickups, you know. So it's always been 00:38:40.429 --> 00:38:42.449 one of our goals from the beginning to have our 00:38:42.449 --> 00:38:45.570 own permitted composting site. So I've been working 00:38:45.570 --> 00:38:49.570 on that for years, but it's very, very challenging. 00:38:50.610 --> 00:38:54.309 So whereas you know Bennett has this you know 00:38:54.309 --> 00:38:56.929 very robust Soil business with multiple soil 00:38:56.929 --> 00:38:59.070 products. That's not something that we've really 00:38:59.070 --> 00:39:01.429 ever looked at we do provide finished compost 00:39:01.429 --> 00:39:04.739 back to our customers, five gallon bucket customers 00:39:04.739 --> 00:39:07.380 get a certain amount free every year, a return 00:39:07.380 --> 00:39:09.059 to them, and then all of our customers can buy 00:39:09.059 --> 00:39:11.559 bags at a discount. Instead of $10 a bag, it's 00:39:11.559 --> 00:39:13.900 $9 a bag. Anyone in our service area can buy 00:39:13.900 --> 00:39:18.800 a bag for $10 a bag as well. But other than our 00:39:18.800 --> 00:39:23.059 compost products, we don't have a lock and way 00:39:23.059 --> 00:39:25.500 on on the soil side of things. We don't have 00:39:25.500 --> 00:39:27.860 anything else besides finished compost. So where 00:39:27.860 --> 00:39:30.360 I've looked for us to grow and expand is by doing 00:39:30.360 --> 00:39:36.300 other kinds of recycling or reuse oriented pickups. 00:39:38.980 --> 00:39:41.739 So I want to look at like what are, what assets 00:39:41.739 --> 00:39:44.780 do we have? You know, we've got these bikes and 00:39:44.780 --> 00:39:49.070 trailers, we've got these motor vehicles. What 00:39:49.070 --> 00:39:50.829 assets can we add? Can we add an electric van? 00:39:50.889 --> 00:39:53.150 Can we add electric vehicles? But what assets 00:39:53.150 --> 00:39:56.630 do we have now? What systems do we have? We have 00:39:56.630 --> 00:39:59.690 an existing customer portal with a ton of options 00:39:59.690 --> 00:40:01.489 for a customer to do a ton of cool things. It's 00:40:01.489 --> 00:40:04.250 very customizable. So what other options can 00:40:04.250 --> 00:40:08.369 we add for customers to add on? So the partnership 00:40:08.369 --> 00:40:10.150 with Rabbit Recycling is the first example of 00:40:10.150 --> 00:40:14.820 that. We've been friendly and kind of loosely 00:40:14.820 --> 00:40:17.699 partnered with Rabbit Recycling for years. The 00:40:17.699 --> 00:40:19.659 nature of our partnership up until recently was 00:40:19.659 --> 00:40:22.000 just one where we would refer customers to them 00:40:22.000 --> 00:40:25.300 and they would refer customers to us. But on 00:40:25.300 --> 00:40:29.039 Earth Day of 2025, we officially launched a partnership 00:40:29.039 --> 00:40:33.320 where we are now making pickups for Rabbit Recycling. 00:40:33.599 --> 00:40:37.179 from our customers or from any customer who wants 00:40:37.179 --> 00:40:40.099 to sign up for Rabbit Recycling Services via 00:40:40.099 --> 00:40:44.179 our systems. So anyone can go to circlecompost 00:40:44.179 --> 00:40:48.800 .com. They can either be interested in signing 00:40:48.800 --> 00:40:52.000 up for composting and recycling and do both. 00:40:52.039 --> 00:40:55.059 You can bundle both services with us. If someone 00:40:55.059 --> 00:40:57.869 bundles both services... Some of our composting 00:40:57.869 --> 00:41:01.070 services are eligible for a discount, a bundling 00:41:01.070 --> 00:41:02.949 discount. We unfortunately can't discount all 00:41:02.949 --> 00:41:04.409 of the services that we offer. We offer a lot 00:41:04.409 --> 00:41:06.710 of composting services, but some of our swap 00:41:06.710 --> 00:41:08.550 bucket services where we take the full bucket 00:41:08.550 --> 00:41:11.849 every time and leave the customer with a clean 00:41:11.849 --> 00:41:14.530 rinse bucket every time, those are eligible for 00:41:14.530 --> 00:41:16.610 a bundling discount when people sign up for Rabbit 00:41:16.610 --> 00:41:19.789 Recycling and our composting services. But also 00:41:19.789 --> 00:41:21.630 if somebody just wants to sign up for Rabbit 00:41:21.630 --> 00:41:24.710 Recycling and wants to do

it with us, They don't 00:41:24.710 --> 00:41:26.769 they don't have to be a composting customer to 00:41:26.769 --> 00:41:29.130 subscribe for rabbit recycling services with 00:41:29.130 --> 00:41:32.190 us and essentially We're just making the pickups 00:41:32.190 --> 00:41:34.530 When it comes to the recycling service, we just 00:41:34.530 --> 00:41:36.150 make the pickups and then we consolidate all 00:41:36.150 --> 00:41:38.670 of the bins that we pick up Those then go to 00:41:38.670 --> 00:41:41.449 rabbit they do all the sorting and ensuring that 00:41:41.449 --> 00:41:43.869 it goes to the proper facility to be recycled 00:41:43.869 --> 00:41:47.510 into new products so one immediate benefit is 00:41:47.510 --> 00:41:53.340 instead of You know having one vehicle come to 00:41:53.340 --> 00:41:55.860 pick up compost and another one come to pick 00:41:55.860 --> 00:41:59.920 up a rabbit recycling bin, we do both in one 00:41:59.920 --> 00:42:03.619 vehicle. That's one benefit and then you know 00:42:03.619 --> 00:42:05.760 another benefit for the customer is they've got 00:42:05.760 --> 00:42:08.739 multiple services now in one place So you know 00:42:08.739 --> 00:42:11.019 rather than having to reach out to rabbit Recycling 00:42:11.019 --> 00:42:13.139 customer service all the customer service for 00:42:13.139 --> 00:42:15.420 any for any customers working with rabbit recycling 00:42:15.420 --> 00:42:17.880 through circle compost We handle 100 % of the 00:42:17.880 --> 00:42:20.360 customer service so anything that that anyone 00:42:20.360 --> 00:42:22.159 needs they reach out to us now You only have 00:42:22.159 --> 00:42:24.920 to reach out to one company for anything you 00:42:24.920 --> 00:42:27.300 need recycling related or composting related 00:42:28.710 --> 00:42:31.550 And the other benefit would be we do offer some 00:42:31.550 --> 00:42:34.989 discounts on select composting services as a 00:42:34.989 --> 00:42:37.389 bundling discount when people sign up for those 00:42:37.389 --> 00:42:50.949 services. We're a founding member of Circular 00:42:50.949 --> 00:42:52.510 Philadelphia. We've been there from the beginning. 00:42:52.909 --> 00:42:55.929 I'd had a relationship with Nick Esposito. I'd 00:42:55.929 --> 00:42:57.630 known him for a while when he worked with the 00:42:57.630 --> 00:43:00.070 city. you know early pandemic things were a little 00:43:00.070 --> 00:43:02.969 crazy and then I reached out to him maybe um 00:43:02.969 --> 00:43:05.489 six or seven months into into the pandemic I 00:43:05.489 --> 00:43:07.909 mentioned to him I thought there was you know 00:43:07.909 --> 00:43:10.949 kind of a void where businesses like like like 00:43:10.949 --> 00:43:13.289 ours like Circle Compost could really use help 00:43:13.289 --> 00:43:16.690 just just kind of navigating the landscape of 00:43:16.690 --> 00:43:21.659 trying to work with municipal government whether 00:43:21.659 --> 00:43:26.039 it's just helping to create new programs or working 00:43:26.039 --> 00:43:28.440 through regulations. And when I called him, the 00:43:28.440 --> 00:43:30.400 first thing he said was, do you know Sandwichin? 00:43:30.780 --> 00:43:34.639 And I said, no, I don't. He said, well, Dave, 00:43:34.659 --> 00:43:37.320 it's crazy. I've been talking to Sandwichin recently 00:43:37.320 --> 00:43:40.019 about launching something, and we're about to 00:43:40.019 --> 00:43:43.900 launch. We're getting close to launching an organization 00:43:43.900 --> 00:43:46.199 to do exactly kind of what you're talking about. 00:43:46.750 --> 00:43:50.710 work and advocacy for members who would become 00:43:50.710 --> 00:43:53.349 part of the organization. And I was surprised, 00:43:53.550 --> 00:43:55.130 you know, now that I know Sandwichin' really 00:43:55.130 --> 00:43:57.929 well, I'm actually surprised that I didn't already 00:43:57.929 --> 00:44:00.170 know her at that point. I was introduced to her 00:44:00.170 --> 00:44:02.329 by Nick. You know, we signed up right away to 00:44:02.329 --> 00:44:05.210 be members of Circular Philadelphia. Spread the 00:44:05.210 --> 00:44:08.070 word about it as much as we can. And Circular 00:44:08.070 --> 00:44:10.250 Philadelphia really, you know, they get things 00:44:10.250 --> 00:44:13.309 done. It's an organization that gets things done 00:44:13.309 --> 00:44:15.960 on behalf of their members. Circular Philadelphia 00:44:15.960 --> 00:44:19.139 is proactive about doing studies, creating white 00:44:19.139 --> 00:44:22.280 papers centered around any number of topics. 00:44:22.820 --> 00:44:24.940 Also just generally, you know, being proactive 00:44:24.940 --> 00:44:27.280 about trying to solve potential problems for 00:44:27.280 --> 00:44:29.420 members before they even come up. Committee calls 00:44:29.420 --> 00:44:31.739 going on regularly, talking about the issues 00:44:31.739 --> 00:44:34.619 that members have, as well as just helping promote 00:44:34.619 --> 00:44:37.039 member organizations and promote their businesses. 00:44:38.579 --> 00:44:40.480 We got involved with Circular Philadelphia. I 00:44:40.480 --> 00:44:42.840 mean, initially it was just because both myself 00:44:42.840 --> 00:44:45.860 and Jen, my business partner. knew both Nick 00:44:45.860 --> 00:44:48.880 Esposito and Sam Witchens and so they were starting 00:44:48.880 --> 00:44:50.719 it they kind of reached out to us and we got 00:44:50.719 --> 00:44:52.980 involved because we're a circular business and 00:44:52.980 --> 00:44:55.300 it makes sense to kind of like have an organization 00:44:55.300 --> 00:44:57.860 that is promoting circular the circular economy 00:44:57.860 --> 00:45:00.159 here in Philadelphia advocating for companies 00:45:00.159 --> 00:45:03.280 like us and to change policies to make companies 00:45:03.280 --> 00:45:06.260 like us more successful and help new companies 00:45:06.260 --> 00:45:08.199 thrive in this space because we really need more

00:45:08.199 --> 00:45:09.860 companies kind of operating in this circular 00:45:09.860 --> 00:45:14.000 space so it kind of for us it was It made sense. 00:45:14.000 --> 00:45:16.719 It was kind of a no -brainer that we would be 00:45:16.719 --> 00:45:20.460 involved with them. You know, their advocacy 00:45:20.460 --> 00:45:22.559 and just kind of like highlighting of these issues 00:45:22.559 --> 00:45:23.920 has certainly been helpful to bringing them to 00:45:23.920 --> 00:45:26.199 the forefront and putting them on people's radars, 00:45:26.260 --> 00:45:28.559 which I think has a value that is hard to kind 00:45:28.559 --> 00:45:34.719 of quantify. The regulatory environment in Pennsylvania 00:45:34.719 --> 00:45:38.699 is not as better than it was five years ago, 00:45:38.699 --> 00:45:42.449 but it's not in a place like some of the neighboring 00:45:42.449 --> 00:45:46.130 states. But, you know, I think that is a place 00:45:46.130 --> 00:45:49.289 where government can step in and kind of help 00:45:49.289 --> 00:45:54.070 to identify land. I mean, we are operating, the 00:45:54.070 --> 00:45:55.630 site that we're on right here is a public -prior 00:45:55.630 --> 00:45:57.519 partnership with the city. The city is a large 00:45:57.519 --> 00:46:00.079 landholder, and there are other opportunities 00:46:00.079 --> 00:46:02.639 for them to partner with other compost companies, 00:46:03.019 --> 00:46:05.380 partner with us on additional sites. I mean, 00:46:05.380 --> 00:46:07.340 I think there's a lot of material that could 00:46:07.340 --> 00:46:10.260 be composted, and that is a place where government 00:46:10.260 --> 00:46:11.920 could step in and kind of help some of the kind 00:46:11.920 --> 00:46:13.679 of initial challenges of getting those things 00:46:13.679 --> 00:46:16.820 off the ground. I think people get very used 00:46:16.820 --> 00:46:19.340 to kind of like, right, like when things feel 00:46:19.340 --> 00:46:21.099 like they're working, people don't question them, 00:46:21.280 --> 00:46:26.119 right? I mean, even with, you know... There was 00:46:26.119 --> 00:46:29.280 a time when there was no kind of like trash collection 00:46:29.280 --> 00:46:31.260 right and so people had to live very close to 00:46:31.260 --> 00:46:34.860 their their waste and that sometimes can lead 00:46:34.860 --> 00:46:36.539 to various health problems right and so the idea 00:46:36.539 --> 00:46:39.139 that like the the magic that you would just put 00:46:39.139 --> 00:46:42.420 your trash at the curb and it would just disappear 00:46:42.420 --> 00:46:46.159 you know that that was probably seemed like a 00:46:46.159 --> 00:46:49.960 very good and and no no while advanced and and 00:46:49.960 --> 00:46:52.679 you know if you look at Philadelphia It used 00:46:52.679 --> 00:46:54.659 to be that the food waste that people threw away 00:46:55.179 --> 00:46:57.659 didn't go to a landfill. It got collected by 00:46:57.659 --> 00:47:00.360 pig farmers

and used as pig feed, right? And 00:47:00.360 --> 00:47:02.519 so eventually that stock that it just got put 00:47:02.519 --> 00:47:05.079 into the regular kind of trash stream, but like 00:47:05.079 --> 00:47:07.400 what can sometimes start, what sometimes can 00:47:07.400 --> 00:47:09.679 start as like what seems like a good idea or 00:47:09.679 --> 00:47:11.519 a good innovation, or is a good innovation at 00:47:11.519 --> 00:47:13.380 the time, as we kind of learn the long -term 00:47:13.380 --> 00:47:15.000 effects or we kind of see how it plays out over 00:47:15.000 --> 00:47:17.800 time, we realize that what's not good about it. 00:47:26.480 --> 00:47:30.980 the entire concept of linear systems. It just 00:47:30.980 --> 00:47:34.760 doesn't work. It's outdated. It's just not a 00:47:34.760 --> 00:47:37.699 sustainable model. So we have limited resources 00:47:37.699 --> 00:47:41.360 on this planet. We have limited resources from 00:47:41.360 --> 00:47:44.780 which we can extract to manufacture new products 00:47:44.780 --> 00:47:47.659 and make new things. And then we have a limited 00:47:47.659 --> 00:47:51.420 amount of space and land where... where this 00:47:51.420 --> 00:47:53.360 stuff could be, you know, buried in the landfill. 00:47:54.920 --> 00:47:57.980 You know, a lot of municipalities turn to incinerating 00:47:57.980 --> 00:48:00.800 because they're out of landfill space or maybe 00:48:00.800 --> 00:48:02.940 it's cheaper for them to incinerate. But, you 00:48:02.940 --> 00:48:04.880 know, incinerating is terrible. You know, it's 00:48:04.880 --> 00:48:06.199 just absolutely terrible for the air that we 00:48:06.199 --> 00:48:10.719 breathe. So we really can't continue down that 00:48:10.719 --> 00:48:13.659 path. We have to employ circular systems and 00:48:13.659 --> 00:48:16.489 it takes, you know... a combination of efforts 00:48:16.489 --> 00:48:19.329 from all stakeholders, private for -profit businesses 00:48:19.329 --> 00:48:23.750 like ours, non -profit organizations, municipalities, 00:48:24.570 --> 00:48:27.030 government at every level, you know, and not 00:48:27.030 --> 00:48:33.010 just in this country but globally. So we need 00:48:33.010 --> 00:48:35.789 circularity. Circular Philadelphia, I'm so thankful 00:48:35.789 --> 00:48:38.260 that the organization exists. We're happy. and 00:48:38.260 --> 00:48:40.039 honored to have been a part of the organization 00:48:40.039 --> 00:48:43.840 from the very beginning. We've met a lot of other 00:48:43.840 --> 00:48:47.380 member businesses who we talk with regularly 00:48:47.380 --> 00:48:49.500 and have some partnerships in place with companies 00:48:49.500 --> 00:48:53.500 like Rabbit Recycling, Goodbye Supply, Remark 00:48:53.500 --> 00:48:55.119 Glass and Bottle Underground, just to name a 00:48:55.119 --> 00:48:58.579 few. The more that our businesses can help each 00:48:58.579 --> 00:49:01.659 other, learn from each other, partner together, 00:49:02.119 --> 00:49:06.699 the more it helps the entire movement. We all 00:49:06.699 --> 00:49:09.840 we all need to do our part and you know businesses 00:49:09.840 --> 00:49:13.400 like ours businesses like other member organizations 00:49:13.400 --> 00:49:16.820 in Circular Philadelphia We provide consumers 00:49:16.820 --> 00:49:20.500 we provide individuals with an opportunity To 00:49:20.500 --> 00:49:23.119 sort of be empowered and do their best to make 00:49:23.119 --> 00:49:29.599 a difference in their day -to -day lives In nature 00:49:29.599 --> 00:49:32.039 everything is kind of circular right? I mean 00:49:32.039 --> 00:49:34.440 there's not a waste product nature doesn't create 00:49:34.440 --> 00:49:38.119 waste it just has different reuses for all these 00:49:38.119 --> 00:49:40.239 different things and so this is kind of a very 00:49:40.239 --> 00:49:43.440 human problem that we've created and a lot of 00:49:43.440 --> 00:49:46.199 solutions are kind of returning to the ways either 00:49:46.199 --> 00:49:48.380 that things happen in the natural world or that 00:49:48.380 --> 00:49:51.460 humans have done, did do for many millennia and 00:49:51.460 --> 00:49:54.059 just in the last, you know, 100 or 200 years 00:49:54.059 --> 00:49:58.829 have kind of shifted away from war. That was 00:49:58.829 --> 00:50:01.210 Tim Bennett from Bennett Compost and Dave Bluvman 00:50:01.210 --> 00:50:03.570 from Circle Compost. They offer doorstep pickup 00:50:03.570 --> 00:50:05.690 of food and organic waste for households and 00:50:05.690 --> 00:50:19.869 businesses across Philadelphia. If I was speaking 00:50:19.869 --> 00:50:23.010 to somebody who never composted ever and I was 00:50:23.010 --> 00:50:25.429 trying to convince them to compost I would invite 00:50:25.429 --> 00:50:27.969 them to check out my trash can and see what's 00:50:27.969 --> 00:50:31.610 not in it. Especially because of how easy the 00:50:31.610 --> 00:50:34.070 services make it. Just sort of hammer home that 00:50:34.070 --> 00:50:37.389 they give you a list of what is compostable. 00:50:37.449 --> 00:50:40.570 I feel like that is a real friction point for 00:50:40.570 --> 00:50:42.710 people. They don't know what can go in composting, 00:50:42.869 --> 00:50:44.829 but the services make it really clear what's 00:50:44.829 --> 00:50:46.469 supposed to go in there. So if you're even new 00:50:46.469 --> 00:50:49.550 to it, you can kind of start slow with the stuff 00:50:49.550 --> 00:50:51.869 that you feel like you think you know and then 00:50:51.869 --> 00:50:55.260 they'll sort of build up from there. Yeah, I 00:50:55.260 --> 00:51:00.079 think I would reiterate how light and un -stinky 00:51:00.079 --> 00:51:03.780 my trash is. I really feel silly sort of harping 00:51:03.780 --> 00:51:06.280 on it, but it was the most immediate feedback 00:51:06.280 --> 00:51:09.119 that I got when I started composting with a service 00:51:09.119 --> 00:51:12.360 here. I would also say something

I've reflected 00:51:12.360 --> 00:51:17.480 on. The longer I am a consumer in my adult life, 00:51:18.039 --> 00:51:22.440 the more... jaded I get interacting with large 00:51:22.440 --> 00:51:25.320 companies when there's any sort of need, when 00:51:25.320 --> 00:51:28.800 there's anything besides a simple one -way purchase 00:51:28.800 --> 00:51:32.179 transaction. And my interactions with both Bennett 00:51:32.179 --> 00:51:35.679 and Circle at different points in the last seven 00:51:35.679 --> 00:51:40.440 years have been nothing but prompt, friendly, 00:51:41.320 --> 00:51:47.519 very informational. It is such a breath of fresh 00:51:47.519 --> 00:51:51.440 air. I get immediate responses. You get text 00:51:51.440 --> 00:51:54.019 messages to confirm that they're still going 00:51:54.019 --> 00:51:59.519 to be picking up on holidays. There's a real 00:51:59.519 --> 00:52:03.519 direct feedback loop of the small business that 00:52:03.519 --> 00:52:05.820 you're working with and supporting. And that 00:52:05.820 --> 00:52:12.159 also feels really good. It's really interesting 00:52:12.159 --> 00:52:14.199 to see something go through its whole cycle. 00:52:14.519 --> 00:52:17.199 Yeah, composting is actually how I got into working 00:52:17.199 --> 00:52:20.539 in sustainability. Back in college, I co -founded 00:52:20.539 --> 00:52:23.380 a community garden called Project Veggie. And 00:52:23.380 --> 00:52:26.500 then my co -founder, Neil Brown, he was like... 00:52:26.480 --> 00:52:29.539 You know what we need? We need compost to rehabilitate 00:52:29.539 --> 00:52:32.039 the soil. And so, yeah, not only did it rehabilitate 00:52:32.039 --> 00:52:36.059 the soil, but then it also gave us a way to compost 00:52:36.059 --> 00:52:38.659 the plants in the garden at the end of each season 00:52:38.659 --> 00:52:41.280 and continue the cycle of making the soil more 00:52:41.280 --> 00:52:43.719 and more productive. It's really cool. Yeah. 00:52:43.820 --> 00:52:47.099 And I mean, it does make me wonder, you know, 00:52:47.099 --> 00:52:50.340 we were able to go from terrible construction, 00:52:50.760 --> 00:52:54.360 amalgamation soil to fruitful, high producing 00:52:54.360 --> 00:52:58.440 garden. What else can we compost? You know, one 00:52:58.440 --> 00:53:00.639 thing I've been really thinking about is how 00:53:00.639 --> 00:53:03.780 we deal with our bodies after we die. And what 00:53:03.780 --> 00:53:06.840 is the most circular or sustainable way to shuffle 00:53:06.840 --> 00:53:10.320 off this mortal coil? Laurel Hill Cemetery's 00:53:10.320 --> 00:53:12.500 president and CEO, Nancy Goldenberg, and their 00:53:12.500 --> 00:53:15.340 assistant superintendent, Ryan Bird, share some 00:53:15.340 --> 00:53:17.179 of the circular innovations that are going on 00:53:17.179 --> 00:53:29.210 within the death industry. Yes, there is such 00:53:29.210 --> 00:53:33.230 a thing as composting humans. It is, however, 00:53:33.449 --> 00:53:38.809 not legal in Pennsylvania yet. It is legal in 00:53:38.809 --> 00:53:43.210 several states, Washington State, I think, being 00:53:43.210 --> 00:53:47.289 the first. It has been introduced in the state 00:53:47.289 --> 00:53:51.650 of Pennsylvania, along with alkaline hydrolysis, 00:53:52.170 --> 00:53:58.760 which is flameless cremation. So instead of cremation 00:53:58.760 --> 00:54:03.960 with fire, it is water -based. So the industry, 00:54:04.059 --> 00:54:07.940 the death industry, is quite innovative, always 00:54:07.940 --> 00:54:11.139 thinking about sustainability, because after 00:54:11.139 --> 00:54:15.139 all, we're also very conscientious about land 00:54:15.139 --> 00:54:21.619 use. And there's only so much land in a cemetery, 00:54:22.579 --> 00:54:27.340 but people continue to pass away. So where are 00:54:27.340 --> 00:54:30.320 we going to bury them once the cemetery gets 00:54:30.320 --> 00:54:35.260 full? So we have to be very mindful of the precious 00:54:35.260 --> 00:54:37.940 land that we do have and how to make the best 00:54:37.940 --> 00:54:44.659 of it. I'm most proud of the fact that we are 00:54:44.659 --> 00:54:49.079 the only cemetery that I'm aware of in the world 00:54:49.079 --> 00:54:55.400 that has earned site gold level, which is a standard. 00:54:55.559 --> 00:55:00.940 of sustainability for one of our three green 00:55:00.940 --> 00:55:06.440 burial areas. And that is a really high, high 00:55:06.440 --> 00:55:10.239 level mark to achieve. And being the only cemetery 00:55:10.239 --> 00:55:13.059 in the world to have achieved that is quite an 00:55:13.059 --> 00:55:17.840 undertaking. And what green burial is, is you 00:55:17.840 --> 00:55:24.420 are not in a casket. There's no embalming. You're 00:55:24.420 --> 00:55:28.679 either in a shroud or you're in a biodegradable 00:55:28.679 --> 00:55:34.059 basket and placed directly into the earth. And 00:55:34.059 --> 00:55:40.420 that particular green burial area is eventually 00:55:40.420 --> 00:55:43.320 going to become a successional forest. So right 00:55:43.320 --> 00:55:46.980 now it's beautiful meadow and pollinators, but 00:55:46.980 --> 00:55:49.739 each year we plant a few more trees there so 00:55:49.739 --> 00:55:53.230 that over time it will become. a forested area. 00:55:53.530 --> 00:55:57.590 Our other two green burial areas, one will remain 00:55:57.590 --> 00:56:04.789 a meadow and the other is landscaped in more 00:56:04.789 --> 00:56:10.849 grasses and sedges and wildflowers. And it too 00:56:10.849 --> 00:56:13.929 is a different type of landscape but sustainable 00:56:13.929 --> 00:56:20.809 and very lovely. Composting happens much quicker. 00:56:21.199 --> 00:56:25.920 and you're actually sandwiched between alfalfa 00:56:25.920 --> 00:56:31.739 and mushrooms and all sorts of goodies and your 00:56:31.739 --> 00:56:36.400 body is then placed in a cylinder and it takes, 00:56:37.000 --> 00:56:40.639 my understanding, it takes

about a month to go 00:56:40.639 --> 00:56:45.420 through the process. You're left with bones and 00:56:45.420 --> 00:56:50.119 compost and that gets mixed together. and at 00:56:50.119 --> 00:56:56.559 least the one I visited, one body, is about 10 00:56:56.559 --> 00:57:03.699 leaf bags of compost. It's a lot. It's a lot 00:57:03.699 --> 00:57:08.300 of compost. Yeah, the green burial, the deceased 00:57:08.300 --> 00:57:11.260 are buried at four feet depth, which is the optimal 00:57:11.260 --> 00:57:14.619 depth to act as a food source for the plants 00:57:14.619 --> 00:57:17.469 that are horticulture. specifically plants directly 00:57:17.469 --> 00:57:20.789 on top of the grave. So it's kind of a there's 00:57:20.789 --> 00:57:23.969 some synergy there in that process, whereas the 00:57:23.969 --> 00:57:26.369 end result of that composting that that material 00:57:26.369 --> 00:57:28.530 could be used anywhere throughout the cemetery. 00:57:28.989 --> 00:57:34.869 Is the green burial popular? Very popular, very 00:57:34.869 --> 00:57:39.489 popular. So the the the first green burial area 00:57:39.489 --> 00:57:44.909 that we instituted. that Ryan referred to as 00:57:44.909 --> 00:57:49.010 Nature Sanctuary, completely sold out. Even the 00:57:49.010 --> 00:57:55.570 expansion of it is sold out. So that's what pushed 00:57:55.570 --> 00:58:01.889 us to increase in other areas, create these two 00:58:01.889 --> 00:58:05.349 new green burial areas, which are also selling 00:58:05.349 --> 00:58:10.380 quite well. Internally, we're already looking 00:58:10.380 --> 00:58:14.980 at expansion of more green burial space. So this 00:58:14.980 --> 00:58:18.860 community really believes in saving the planet. 00:58:31.469 --> 00:58:33.730 Thanks for listening to episode 3 of the Circle 00:58:33.730 --> 00:58:35.929 Up podcast. You can learn more about Bennett 00:58:35.929 --> 00:58:38.070 Compost and Circle Compost by visiting their 00:58:38.070 --> 00:58:41.369 websites, BennettCompost .com and CircleCompost 00:58:41.369 --> 00:58:44.130 .com. And if you want to learn more about green 00:58:44.130 --> 00:58:46.650 burials, you can find information and even visit 00:58:46.650 --> 00:58:49.010 the green burial sites at Laurel Hill Cemetery. 00:58:49.969 --> 00:58:52.130 We have those sites and a whole lot more resources 00:58:52.130 --> 00:58:54.670 in the show notes. Join us next time to talk 00:58:54.670 --> 00:58:56.650 about other opportunities for circularity in 00:58:56.650 --> 00:59:00.239 our food systems. The Circle Up podcast is presented 00:59:00.239 --> 00:59:03.280 by Circular Philadelphia. It was produced by 00:59:03.280 --> 00:59:06.340 Meredith Nutting at Cool Goon Productions. This 00:59:06.340 --> 00:59:08.880 podcast was supported by a grant from Penn Treaty 00:59:08.880 --> 00:59:11.659 Special Services District. If you want to learn 00:59:11.659 --> 00:59:14.579 more about the circular economy, go to circularphiladelphia 00:59:14.579 --> 00:59:15.400 .org.